In recent years, development of a laser light source emitting a light of a red wavelength region has made the use of a silver halide photographic light-sensitive material recorded by the laser source active in the printing or medical fields. Particularly in the printing field a large amount of facsimile films or scanner films are used, and a helium-neon laser having an output wavelength of 632.8, a semiconductor laser having an output wavelength of 650-700 nm and a light emitting diode (LEWD) are used.
However, a dye having a high spectral sensitivity in a red-light wavelength region is difficult to dissolve out on development, and the elimination of the residual color stains is insufficient when rapid processing or a small amount of replenishing is conducted as in recent years. As a result, a serious problem occurs in view of photographic properties or commercial value.
The prior art improving such residual color stains of the light sensitive material is disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,493,747 and 2,526,632 incorporating a water solubilizing group to a cyanine dye. Further, there are proposed methods that use a three nuclear merocyanine dye disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication Open to Public Inspection No.2-143242 and a three nuclear merocyanine dye having two water solubilizing groups disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication Open to Public Inspection No.3-171135.
However, when the replenishing amount of a developer replenisher is small as not more than 300 ml/m.sup.2 of a light sensitive material and the pH of a developer is not more than 10.9, these sensitizing dyes had problems in that the dyes dissolved out the light sensitive material or decomposition products thereof accumulated in the developer and had an adverse effect on photographic properties, and in that the developer was dyed resulting in dyeing the light sensitive material. Particularly, the problems are remarkable in a hybrid light sensitive material containing a tetrazolium salt likely to be influenced by development conditions, a hydrazine compound or a pyridium salt as a contrast increasing agent. Therefore, a new development technique has been demanded on small amounts of replenishing.